1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an image information print system such as a printer and an image information print method for processing print information input to the print system and printing on storage media.
2. Description of the Related Art
A conventional printer repeats steps of receiving print information sent from a host computer, storing it in a predetermined location, converting the format of the print information to generate intermediate print information, storing the intermediate print information in a predetermined location, converting the intermediate print information into image data, storing the image data in a predetermined location, and printing the stored image data in the storage order in page units. Therefore, to test print of only the first page, it is necessary to input such a command to the host computer and transmit print information of only the first page to the printer. To print more than one copy of the same document, print information of such a duplicate portion needs to be transmitted from the host computer. For example, to use a reverse order print mode, print information needs to be transmitted in the reverse order from the host computer.
In any way, how the printer prints depends completely on how the print information is transmitted by the host computer, and changing the print specifications such as reversing the print order or performing a test print of only the first page is not possible after the print information is transmitted.
Some conventional printers are provided with a face-up paper discharge unit, a face-down paper discharge unit, a sorter paper discharge unit, etc., as a paper discharge unit.
The face-down paper discharge unit, which discharges paper with the print face of a recording medium down, enables the print result of N pages to be sorted in the page order.
The face-up paper discharge unit, which discharges paper with the print face of a recording medium up, places the print result of N pages in the reverse order to the page order.
The sorter paper discharge unit, which has, for example, P paper discharge ports, enables the host computer to specify paper discharge ports for printing. Thus, M copies of an N-page print can also be printed.
The sorter paper discharge unit also enables printing with face-down paper discharge. In this case, the first page is discharged to the first to Mth paper discharge ports one sheet to each port, next the second page is discharged to the first to Mth paper discharge ports one sheet to each port, . . . last the Nth page is discharged to the first to Mth paper discharge ports one sheet to each port, whereby M copies of the N-page print sorted in the page order can be provided. This will be discussed specifically as follows:
FIG. 2 shows an example of a sorter paper discharge unit, which will be hereinafter abbreviated as the sorter. Information sent from a host 1 is processed by a controller 7 and is printed on paper 13 by an engine 11, and the paper is sent to a fixing roller 20. The paper 13 passing through the fixing roller 20 is diverted by a face up/down switch 34 to a face-up tray 31 if face-up print is executed or to the sorter 30 if face-down print is executed.
For face-down print, the sorter 30 can be used in various manners; here, the operation of the sorter 30 when the number of copies is specified will be discussed. For example, to make five copies of a print consisting of N pages, the paper of the first copy of the first page of the N-page print is discharged to a bin 32a, the paper of the second copy of the first page of the N-page print is discharged by a switch 33b to a bin 32b, . . . , and the paper of the fifth copy is discharged by a switch 33e to a bin 32e. Next, the paper of the first copy of the second page of the N-page print is discharged to the bin 32a, the paper of the second copy of the second page of the N-page print is discharged by the switch 33b to the bin 32b, . . . , and the paper of the fifth copy is discharged by the switch 33e to the bin 32e. When the steps are repeated until the fifth copy is printed, all print is complete. Thus, five copies of the N-page print are made on the bins 32a-32e.
On the other hand, to print one copy of an N-page print in a face-up paper discharge mode using a sorter paper discharge unit, an N-page print sorted in the reverse order to the page order is made because paper is discharged with the print faces of recording media up as described above. Thus, the operator must resort the print result in the page order after print.
Also, the sorter paper discharge unit is expensive and large and occupies a large installation area.
Further, when the sorter paper discharge unit has P paper discharge ports, if P&lt;M, print needs to be executed separately integer [(M+P-1)/P] times, and takes time. This means that although the 6-stage sorter is shown in the example in FIG. 2, the host 13 must send print information to the printer repeatedly [(M+6-1)/6] times if the number of copies M becomes seven or more.
Printers having no sorter paper discharge unit for the reasons as described above are also known. In this case, to attempt to print M copies of an N-page print, normally a host computer transmits print information to a printer in the order of M copies of the first page, M copies of the second page, . . . , M copies of the Nth page, and the printer prints M copies of the first page, M copies of the second page, . . . , M copies of the Nth page in order.
In this case, however, the operator must resort the print media of M copies each consisting of N pages taken out from the paper discharge ports so that the first to Nth pages sorted make up one copy for convenience of distribution of the copies.
This problem becomes furthermore serious when M copies of a print made up of a group consisting of Na, Nb, Nc, . . . , Nx pages (Na, Nb, Nc, . . . , Nx are integers of 1 or more independently of each other) are made. That is, to make M copies of a print made up of (Na+Nb+Nc+ . . . +Nx) pages, one copy consisting of 1, 2, . . . , Na, one copy consisting of 1, 2, . . . , Nb, one copy consisting of 1, 2, . . . , Nx must be taken out from M copies of the first page, M copies of the second page, . . . , M copies of the Nath page, M copies of the first page, M copies of the second page, . . . , M copies of the Nbth page, . . . , M copies of the first page, M copies of the second page, . . . , M copies of the Nxth page printed in order for finally providing M copies of one distribution unit (Na+Nb+Nc+ . . . +Nx).
Then, to eliminate the complicated procedure, a method is proposed wherein output of repeating printing of print matter of pages 1-N M times or output of repeating printing of print matter of (Na+Nb+Nc+ . . . +Nx) pages consecutively M times is performed from a host computer to a printer.
However, this method involves a problem that it takes much time as compared with the method using the sorter paper discharge unit.
This problem also means that to print more than one copy of a print made up of more than one page, any other operation cannot be executed over a long time in the host computer which does not accept another command until the printing is complete.
If the host computer is provided with a print information spool function, print information is sent by background processing until the printing of more than one copy is complete, thus the printing speed of the printer lowers and the operation of the host computer also slows down because of the background print processing.
Further, even if the method is used, the problem that in the face-up print mode, the resultant print pages must be resorted in the order of the first page to the Nth page still remains unsolved.